


QUEER

by EvanBlack



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-16
Updated: 2020-01-16
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:01:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22277524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EvanBlack/pseuds/EvanBlack
Summary: In the face of Scully's everlasting resistance, Mulder starts to question his own sexuality.Don't panic. It all turns out okay in the end.
Relationships: Fox Mulder/Dana Scully, Fox Mulder/Other(s)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 29





	QUEER

**Author's Note:**

> Please do not re-post to any other site without writer's permission.

Dana Scully watched her partner while she pretended to be going through the filing cabinets looking for X Files containing references to manifestations suspected of being humans in lupine form. She'd rather call it that in her mind than even go near to thinking about the word 'werewolves'.

Considering they were investigating a case involving one of Mulder's top ten favorite paranormal phenomena, her partner seemed strangely pre-occupied. He sat with his feet up on the corner of his overloaded desk, the sleeves of his blue shirt rolled past his elbows. It was hot and Mulder had gone wild and undone his top button and loosened his tie, so Scully could see the dip at the base of his throat as he stared off into the distance - also known as the opposite wall of their grungy basement office.

'Mulder?'

'Huh?' He turned his wide eyes towards her and Scully felt a little thrill pass through her. For the thousandth time she wondered when that was going to stop happening every time he looked at her, but after six years together, she thought it was unlikely now that it ever would.

'You okay?'

'Um, yeah.' He lowered his feet and sat forward in his chair, trying to give the impression that he was focused and raring to go, but Scully knew better. There were still clouds in those eyes, behind which his real thoughts were slinking about in the dark, waiting to come out and play.

Scully wasn't wrong.

Even the promise of werewolves in New Jersey wasn't enough to keep Mulder's mind on the job today. Mulder's mind - a marvel of modern science - was instead firmly focused on his sex life. Or lack thereof - he reminded himself with brutal honesty. 

He had been working out how long it had been for him. How long since he'd had sex with someone else in the room. Kristen Killar was the last time he'd got laid. A one-night stand three years before, and she'd killed herself just hours later. Mulder didn't even want to examine what that might say about him in the bedroom.

And before that? Oh god. Before that was... Diana Fowley. When he was fresh out of Quantico. Jesus, nineteen-eighty-something-he-didn't-even-want-to-remember. At least they hadn't had any problems in the bedroom, he reassured himself. No, the bedroom was just about the only place they DIDN'T have any problems. Every other aspect of their relationship had been a spectacular failure though - right up to and including the moment he'd come home to find a letter from the woman he thought he loved, effectively telling him 'goodbye and thanks for all the orgasms'. Her career was going places, his had started to veer worryingly onto the off-ramp to Crapperville, and never the twain shall meet, in Diana's mind. At least she'd only emigrated, not killed herself. 

And before that....? Phoebe. Mulder sighed. He'd been so out of his depth in Phoebe Green that it made him smart with embarrassment. At first it had been so flattering to have a girlfriend who was not only older than him, not to mention beautiful and clever, but also wanted him every minute of every day. At first it had been paradise. Phoebe was predatory in her sexual preferences, but the young Fox Mulder had risen to every occasion, passed every test and stayed every course. In the course of a single term at Oxford, he'd gone from a fumbling teenager to a fully-paid-up member of the Phoebe Green fuck club. Although Mulder had no idea when he signed on that club membership was temporary. Phoebe dragged him out of lectures so she could ride his hand in the wood-panelled supplies room, pounced on him as he jogged and dragged him into the neatly-tended shrubbery where she pressed her breasts around his eager cock until he came on her face, and slipped past the porters to suck him dry in his tiny, ancient little dorm room under the college eaves. It was all good stuff, thought Mulder, and his cock agreed with the memories and hardened in his neat charcoal Armanis.

And then she upped the ante.

Suddenly every encounter was fraught with danger. Phoebe could barely come unless they were a hair's breadth from discovery. She started by taking him on the cold stone slab of Arthur Conan Doyle's grave, the fingers of midnight mist stroking his naked ass as he pounded into her, her legs around his ears. A week later she went down on him under the refectory table during supper. One minute he'd smiled at her where she sat, a dozen places down, and the next he felt rough hands pushing his knees apart, and his startled penis being prised from his corduroy jeans. Mulder had had to continue a conversation he'd started with Professor Childs about the comparative merits of Freudian vs Jungian analysis, as Phoebe made her mouth into a tight, hot tunnel where his dick desperately sought light at the other end as she speeded him towards a climax so fast and hard that he'd had to fake choking in order to mask his groans, and double over so he could zip himself up before some eager bastard gave him the Heimlich maneuver. By the time he could breathe again, Phoebe was licking ice cream out of her bowl with a tongue that suggested she'd just tasted something quite as sweet.

The final straw was his roommate, Sam Short. Sam and Mulder had reached an understanding. When either of them had someone back to the room for sex, they'd leave Sam's old school tie on the door. The other roomie would give a particular knock and come back in an hour. Their only other rule was that they wouldn't use each others beds. Phoebe asked Mulder about it one night as they sneaked past the porter and staggered drunkenly upstairs to the attic rooms, only to find the tie on the door handle and nowhere to fuck. It didn't stop Phoebe, who opened her legs for him right there outside his room, and he took her doggy-style on the creaking wooden stairs.

Afterwards she jerked her head at the door: 'Is he gay?'

'Sam?! No! I don't think so' But Mulder frowned. He'd never even considered Sam might be gay. He was a blue-eyed boy with short dark hair and skin so pale it was almost see-through. He wore Doc Marten boots and skintight jeans and T-shirts with retro band names on - 'T-Rex Rox' 'Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars' - He sure didn't act gay, although all these English college kids were a lot less gung-ho than the boys he was used to back home, even in refined New England.

Phoebe grinned, her eyes shining, and Mulder felt his stomach quiver. He knew that look by now and had started to fear it.

'He's as bent as a nine-bob note.' 

'Bullshit'.

Phoebe raised her eyebrows. 'Compelling argument Mulder. You should go up for debating.' 

Mulder grinned and stuffed his softening cock back into his jeans.

'You think he fancies you?'

'Don't be stupid.'

'Stoopid, hey?'

'I didn't say stoopid.'

'Yes you did, you bloody Yank.'

She was silent again then. Mulder wished she'd put her panties back on. Anyone could come up the stairs, or open the door to his room. Sam was definitely in there - now that he and Phoebe were quiet again, he could hear bedsprings squeaking. Phoebe was listening too.

'You ever fuck another guy Mulder?'

'No.'

'You ever want to?'

'No.'

She sat up and looked into his eyes searchingly but he only grinned; it was the truth. She seemed to acknowledge that fact and nodded.

'Shame.'

'Shame?!'

'I always wanted to get fucked by a guy who was getting fucked by another guy.'

'Jesus Phoebe!' He laughed, but a jolt of electricity raced through his balls and ass at the image she'd drawn in his mind.

Mulder jumped as the door suddenly opened. Sam looked at them and flushed. The person with him was another boy - a kid in Mulder's ethics class called Stephen Loots. Phoebe raised her eyebrows at Mulder and he blushed too. 

'Oh, hi,' Sam managed. 'How long have you two been waiting?'

'Long enough,' said Phoebe, much to Mulder's embarrassment, and got up. She grabbed the hair at the back of his head and twisted it painfully as she kissed him, pushing 'Told you so' into his mouth along with her hot tongue.

Stephen muttered something to him and hurried past Phoebe and Mulder, and Phoebe followed him down, leaving her panties on the landing for anyone to see. 

Sam was awkward with Mulder. He didn't speak and Mulder didn't know what to say. He didn't give a shit if Sam was gay - as long as he didn't try anything with him, he was fine with it. But he didn't really want to discuss it with him either.

'Got any beer?'

Sam looked at him gratefully. 'Think so. Hang on.' He reached under his bed and brought out a couple of bottles of Guinness. At least English beer - or Irish in this case - was supposed to be drunk at room temp, thought Mulder as Sam handed him a bottle. Mulder flopped onto his bed and Sam did the same. 

'Did you get your paper in on time?' It was a weak line, but Mulder had to try. Sam smiled and nodded. 'Yeah. Only just though. Carrick gave me a dressing down but that's his favourite thing in the whole wide world.'

'Apart from feeling up Victoria Sloane, I hear.'

'Oh yeah?' Sam's eyes always lit up at gossip, and they were away, just like buddies. Mulder breathed a sigh of relief.

But the next time he and Phoebe were alone in his room...

Now, nearly 20 years later, Mulder shifted in his chair. Something told him he was getting close to where his free-association thinking had been getting him ever so slowly for the past hour. His brain hadn't taken him straight there, it had led him round the houses first, letting him pass this idea in the darkness a few times before finally brushing up against it.

The next time they were alone in his room, with Sam's tie on the door, Phoebe had tied him up. They'd tied each other up before. Mulder had had the best orgasm of his life tied to this very bed when Phoebe suddenly put a pillow over his face just as he was about to shoot his load up into her writhing body. 

But this time, they didn't get that far.

This time Phoebe tied him up, rock hard and ready, and then climbed off him and left. As she did, she took the tie off the door handle. 

'Phoebe, what the fuck are you doing?' he said desperately, yanking at the soft ropes they always used on each other.

'See you later Mulder.'

'Phoebe!! Fuck!'

She left and Mulder fumed and wriggled and did his best to free himself. His hard on subsided pretty fast but his anger was still simmering away when Sam burst into the room half an hour later. His eyes widened as he saw Mulder strapped naked to the bed.

'Hi. What's up?'

'Phoebe's idea of a joke,' Mulder fumed.

Sam gave a small grin and Mulder blushed as he watched his roomie's eyes glance quickly down his body.

'You gonna untie me or what?'

'Er, yes, of course. Sorry. I was just surprised.' He hurried across the room and started tugging at the rope on Mulder's right wrist. It took him a while - Phoebe's family all sailed and her knots were demons - but finally he freed Mulder's right hand. Then he moved to Mulder's right ankle. Mulder watched him carefully and saw Sam's eyes sweep across his cock as he moved down the bed. The boy blushed as he started working the next knot free. Mulder wondered why he hadn't untied his left hand too, then he could have freed his own ankles.

Mulder looked down as he felt tension on his ankle release. As he did, he noticed that Sam - while now keeping his eyes averted from Mulder's cock - was getting aroused anyway. Mulder felt hot with embarrassment at the thought that his roommate had a hard on for him. He closed his eyes and felt Sam kneel on the bed to reach his left ankle. After what seemed like an age, he got it free. 

Mulder was horribly aware that neither of them were talking and the tension in the air was already thick and building. Sam apparently felt the same thing because - as he moved back up the bed and knelt beside Mulder's head, he said: 'Last one.'

Mulder only nodded. He couldn't speak, as Sam's swollen crotch almost bumped his nose as he leaned over to undo the final knot. Mulder could smell his arousal - a raw, primitive smell that was at once completely familiar but also so alien and new - smelling another man's excitement - that his own cock twitched. God no! please don't let me get hard! He willed Sam to hurry up with the knot while he tried desperately to think of un-sexy things, but it was difficult with Sam's jeans-clad dick almost down his throat. Fuck Phoebe, the bitch! Mulder's anger flared and with relief he felt blood that had been swirling towards his cock change direction and pound back into his head.

'That fucking bitch.' he said.

Sam nodded, relieved to have something to say. 'You going to break up with her?'

'You betcha ass I am!' he stormed, and Sam laughed. Finally Mulder's wrist was free and he sat up.

'Thanks.'

'My pleasure.' said Sam and then blushed deeply. Mulder shrugged it off - he knew Sam was only being his usual polite self. 

Once again, neither of them spoke of the incident. Even when Mulder continued to fuck Phoebe, Sam kept his mouth shut. 

Now, 20 years older and about five years wiser, Fox Mulder almost groaned at what a fool he'd been. Instead of rightfully dumping Phoebe over the incident, he'd continued to play the role of her sexual lapdog until SHE’D dumped HIM - for her criminology professor, who was less... gender-specific about his bedmates. When she'd told him it was over and who she was leaving him for, she'd still had the cheek to tell him: 'Anytime you want to join us, Mulder, you'd always be welcome.'

So there it was, thought Mulder with some relief. Sam Short - the place his brain had been trying to take him for days now. And it didn't take an Oxford grad to figure out why.

Mulder loved Scully. Or at least, he thought he did. As he'd never told her without one of them being drugged or close to death, he didn't know if it was reciprocated. Or, if it was reciprocated, whether a relationship with Scully could ever be as satisfying in reality as his fantasies teased. Maybe, once they'd kissed and necked and fucked, the sheen would be gone from the relationship. Maybe she was frigid. Maybe she wouldn't go down on him (It was hard enough to live without it outside a relationship - he couldn't bear it if he didn't get the occasional blow job from the woman he loved). Maybe she was just boring once the frisson of denial was over. Maybe he only wanted her because she showed no signs of ever letting him have her. 

Mulder didn't think any of the above was true. But he couldn't be sure because when it came to a relationship, he and Scully were still as far apart today as they had been when she’d first walked into this office six years ago. 

He sighed deeply. He had a terrible feeling that things were getting to a critical mass with him. How much longer could he possibly lust after, moon over, and dream of Scully without simply dying of a bad case of blue balls? He was hard now, sure, because of thinking about all the filthy things he'd done with Phoebe. But even when he wasn't trying to think about sex he got hard three or four times a day in the office alone. It had got so bad that sometimes when he got home he'd jerk off in his apartment before he even took his coat off. A  
couple of times he'd done it in the parking garage before driving home. If masturbation really was a sin, then he was on a fast-track to hell with no U-turns in sight.

And that was where Sam Short came in. Mulder had - over the past few months - started to wonder about his own sexual preferences. 

Despite the uncomfortably hard evidence in his pants every day, his lust was reserved exclusively for Scully. He couldn't remember the last time he'd got hard for a real woman who wasn't Scully. He wasn't counting porn or the phone-sex account that cost him more every month than his cable bill, because in his mind every fuck-object was Scully. He was thinking about getting turned on by a real, living, breathing human being. And that's when he'd started his journey back in time, using his own hard ons as stepping stones. Kristen Killar was three years back and he'd barely touched down. Diana was a hot but much more conventional step away. Phoebe was a deadly ragged rock as opposed to a stepping stone. There had been occasional one-night stands between them, and he also wasn't counting Daisy Lucker who had taken his virginity at 16 and let him fuck her on and off all through high school, because she'd done that for almost all the boys. 

Sam Short was a small repressed memory - a stepping pebble, well below the surface of the sluggish stream that was his sexual history.

But it was Scully's apparently impervious resistance to him that finally made him start to think about what a total burnout he was as a lover of women. Early teenage conquests had been exciting but fleeting experiments so didn't count. Phoebe had used him; Diana had used him; even Kristen Killar had used him, just as he'd used her. Only Scully wasn't using him, even though he wished she would.

Mulder realized he was at an all-time low in his confidence with women. And so his thoughts turned - finally - to Sam Short. 

His thoughts turned to men.

Maybe he was such a failure with women because he was just fooling himself. Maybe it was time to examine the possibility that he may be gay. The thought made him feel hot and panicky inside, but he forced himself to confront his fears. 

The more he thought about it, the more frightened he got. He'd always been quiet, sensitive - an outsider - even as a boy. Being horribly honest with himself, he could also remember boyhood locker room fumblings with Jack Leverett after baseball one afternoon. Jack had roughly tugged him to an amazed, confused hardness. Someone had come in before it could go any further, but Mulder had thought he would die of shame and pleasure. 

Just the memory made Mulder think he might die of shame and pleasure right here and now in the basement office with Scully banging about in the filing cabinet behind him.

'Mulder?'

'Huh?'

'You okay?'

Mulder dropped his feet off his desk and spun his seat to face Scully, his stretched crotch effectively hidden by his desk. She was looking at him curiously. He must've been miles away.

'Um, yeah.' he tried to look bright and focused but all he could see was the woman he wanted so much it made him desperate and crazy. People always said there were plenty more fish in the sea, but Mulder wasn't convinced. He didn't want another fish, anyway. 

He sighed.

Maybe he'd just have to try another sea.

***

It was a week since Mulder had decided to experiment and he'd done nothing about it but worry and wonder. It was ridiculous, he told himself. Did he WANT to waste his life making pathetic attempts to forge relationships with women (ie Scully) if he wasn't meant to be straight? And - even worse - if he was ever bold enough to make a move on Scully, was it really fair to her if he wasn't sure he was straight?

But he FELT straight. Didn't he? 

Mulder mulled over that one for a while and came to the conclusion that, yes, he felt straight, but the memories of Sam Short and Jack Leverett plagued him. So - like his work - he couldn't discount extreme possibilities. 

Mulder realized finally that he'd already made his decision; now all he was doing was procrastinating because he had no idea what to do next. Where did a 39 year old man go to decide whether he might be gay? How did he decide when he got there? And who the hell did he decide with?? 

Sitting on his couch, Mulder made a list.

1\. Friends  
2\. Family  
3\. Colleagues  
4\. Clubs  
5\. Escort agency  
6\. Male prostitute

The moment the list was finished he felt ashamed that he'd committed his thoughts to paper. Christ! If he felt guilty about writing the list, how was he going to feel if he ever got his dick in another guy's mouth?!

Mulder crossed some things off the list.

First he crossed off 'Family' because effectively he didn't have any. It had just come naturally after 'Friends'. 

Then he crossed off 'Friends' because his only friends were Scully, who was excluded from the experiment for obvious reasons, and the Lone Gunmen because even if all three of them were closet queens, Mulder couldn't imagine himself either telling or fucking any of them. He was sure Byers would be polite and Frohike would be secretly delighted at the thought that Mulder was out of the Scully scenario. Like he'd stand a chance if he were the last man on earth. But Langley was made of less tactful stuff and Mulder knew he'd never let him forget it.

Then he crossed off Male Prostitute just because he couldn't bear to let it stay on the paper, in case some freakish event saw the page blow off his coffee table, through the open window and drift down to the street below where Scully just happened to be passing, just happened to pick it off the sidewalk and just happened to recognize his handwriting. Then she'd think he was gay and he'd never stand a chance. Although, of course, he didn't stand a chance now...

Still, he crossed it off, drawing a rectangle around it and blacking it in so thoroughly that nothing remained of the letters.

So,  
3\. Colleagues  
4\. Clubs  
5\. Escort agency

Mulder knew that an escort agency was effectively the same as prostitution but it looked better on paper. 

The only reason Colleagues was still on the list was because of Danny. Danny and Mulder had been friends for years before Mulder realized Danny was gay. Mulder flushed at the memory - he was only a fucking Oxford psychology graduate; how could he be expected to pick up on tiny personal details like that?? He'd finally cottoned on when Danny introduced him to Ralph in a bar on M Street and then - three hours and seven beers later - proceeded to put his tongue down Ralph's throat like he'd lost his car keys down there.

Mulder's face must have been shocked out of its usual paralysis because when Danny withdrew from Ralph and looked at him next, he blushed and then laughed: 'Don't tell me you didn't know!'

Mulder had reddened too and shook his head. Like a man whose life was flashing before his eyes in the path of an oncoming train, Mulder remembered a dozen little moments that should have given him the heads up. Danny laughingly grabbing his ass during a game of one-on-one; waking up from a basement nap to find Danny watching him sleep - with an excuse about how tired he looked and how he didn't want to wake him just to give him the result on some plates he'd run for him; Danny buying him an expensive dress shirt one birthday, while Mulder hadn't even remembered it WAS his birthday, and had sure as hell never known when Danny's was.

And then, when Mulder finally twigged, he was happy for Danny - and a little flattered that he been an apparent object of affection for so long - even if he hadn't been aware of it at the time. 

There! See?! If he was straight, surely he'd have taken a swing at Danny in defense of his masculinity, rather than shrug, grin, blush and get another round of drinks in? What kind of fag was he?!

Then Mulder sighed and crossed 'Colleagues' off the list. If he was going to go through with this experiment, then whatever the outcome, Mulder didn't want anyone he knew knowing about it.

For the same reason, he quickly crossed out Clubs. The thought of dressing in tight leather pants and putting himself on display for other men made him feel plain stupid.

That only left Escort Agency.

Mulder sighed again. He'd made a decision and now he was going to have to go through with it to satisfy his own curiosity, if nothing else. 

A knock on the door made him jump. He balled up the paper and looked through the peephole. It was Scully. 

She came in and he got them both a beer. She'd come over to show him her report on the case in Florida, even though it could have waited til tomorrow, Mulder thought. 

'This could've waited til tomorrow Scully.'

She shrugged: 'I wanted to know what you thought.'

Mulder said nothing. He felt bad that Scully apparently felt the need to go from work to home and then work there too. He did, but he had no life. Scully had a life. Or, at least, he assumed she did. He didn't like to pry into her private life. He knew he made huge demands on Scully at work, and tried hard to leave her alone after hours. Of course, he didn't always succeed, and some of the reasons he 'had to' see Scully after work were pretty tenuous, he knew. 

After about three seconds of feeling bad about Scully, Mulder allowed himself to feel really happy that she was in his apartment, drinking beer. 

She curled onto the couch and nodded at the TV. 'What you watching?'

'When Good Dogs Go Bad.'

She raised her eyebrows.

'You were expecting 'Hot Whip Vixens'?'

'It would be less surprising.'

Mulder looked at his watch. 'I have a strict no-porn-before-nine rule.'

'I like a man with standards.'

'Yeah, well, I don't always stick to them.'

'I like a man who's flexible.'

'Wanna find out how flexible, Scully?' he leered.

She arched an eyebrow at him predictably: 'I've seen you fly coach, Mulder. It doesn't get more flexible than that.'

'Touche, Scully.' They clinked beer bottles and Mulder used a long slug of Sam Adams to half-close his eyes and check Scully out. She was wearing a tight white T and faded Levis that made her ass look like a little blue peach. Of course, she was sitting on it right now, but Mulder had memorized the view.

He perused the Florida report. Or at least he pretended to. He knew it would be perfect because Scully never submitted anything that wasn't perfect, even to him. It made him try harder to tidy up his own reports so she wouldn't think he was a dolt. It was a pain in the ass to do capitals at the start of every sentence but Mulder did them for Scully. He guessed it must be love.

He smiled at the thought and Scully caught it. 'What's funny Mulder.'

'Nothing.'

'Share with me.'

'What?' he asked, looking at her now with mock innocence, 'Beer? Toothbrush? Bodily fluids?'

'Sounds like a standard day at the Quantico morgue.'

He smiled at her joke but felt a pang inside. Her deflections had the power to make him feel less like a sexual being - less of a man. Would it kill her to JUST ONCE throw a banter bone back in his direction? His pang faded and his own innate sense of fairness kicked in. Why the hell should Scully come back at him when he made those remarks? Did he really even want her to? Hell, if she did, things would escalate so fast that Mulder wasn't sure he could be responsible for his actions. He was always at least half-hard around Scully and the slightest encouragement would probably end in disaster. As a naturally pessimistic man, Mulder could imagine that disaster taking many and varied forms. The least obnoxious would be him making an asshole of himself by saying something truly inappropriate like 'I love you Scully'; then there was a sharply rising scale of disaster. Having walked around half crippled by his dick for six long years, it would be just his luck if he failed to get hard. And if he did get hard, maybe Scully wouldn't want him in her - it had happened a couple of times to Mulder that girls chickened out once they saw his dick. He knew he was a bit larger than average and wasn't being ungrateful, but it would be a bitter irony if Scully wanted him - just not quite so much of him. And if she did want him, maybe he wouldn't be able to make her come. Maybe the simpatico they had was just a work thing and wouldn't crossover into the bedroom. The thought made him grimace, it pained him so.

'You okay?'

'Huh?' 

'You look like you're in pain Mulder.'

'No. I'm fine.'

'C'mon Mulder, what's up?'

'What do you mean Scully.'

She sighed and put her half-full beer on the coffee table.

'Mulder, for weeks you've been moping about and drifting off. There's something on your mind, so spit it out and let's work through it together.'

He almost laughed at the thought. Sure Scully, my problem is that quite soon, I'm going to have to have sex with a man just to find out if that's why I'm not man enough for you. Any ideas?

Instead he shook his head. He couldn't lie to Scully and tell her there was nothing wrong, but he sure as hell wasn't about to put his final morsel of dignity through the shredder in front of her either. 

Scully sighed and stood up with a half-smile. 'You're no fun Mulder. I'm going home.'

He nodded; he knew she was only half-joking.

He knew he had to get this thing sorted. And soon.

***

Saturday night. April 12. Mulder kept looking at the date window in his watch, wondering how April 12 would be logged in his memory from this night on. A triumph? A life changing night? A fumbling embarrassment?

He'd showered and shaved and started to dress like he was going on a date. Then he'd stripped off every stitch of clothing and put back on the jeans and T he'd been wearing all day. Fuck it, it felt weird enough to be waiting for a date with a guy without feeling like he was going to the fucking prom into the bargain. He was paying, so he could wear whatever the hell he felt like wearing.

As 8pm approached, Mulder started to sweat. He felt sick. Half a dozen times he started to call the agency to cancel and was in the middle of dialling again when there was a knock on the door. 

'Shit.' For a crazy moment he thought about not answering it, then remembered that the $400 would be coming off his credit card bill anyway, and opened the door.

A man of about his own age stood there. Mulder had pictured a cheesy guy with blond flick-ups and a bad tux, but this man looked like a million guys in sports bars all over the USA. He was taller than Mulder and muscular, with short dark hair and a wide, friendly smile.

'Hi,' he said, almost shyly, 'I'm Chris.' He stuck out his hand and Mulder shook it automatically, then opened the door wider to invite him in. Chris wandered into the room then turned to look at Mulder, who stood nervously by the open door as if he may make a break from his own apartment any second now. 

Chris cleared his throat and nodded at the door. 'We going out? Or staying in?'

Mulder knew this was the make or break moment. Chris was giving him an out - he'd leave now and Mulder wouldn't have to do this. It was a close call. Mulder didn't want to have sex with Chris but he knew he had to get through this to lay the worrying ghosts of Sam Short and Jack Leverett to rest once and for all. Or to bring them tumbling out of the closet with him. The image made Mulder smile a little. What the hell, he thought, you don't have to fuck him but at least get the guy a beer.

Slowly he closed the door. 'You mind if we stay in?' Chris shook his head and smiled: 'Anything that makes you comfortable.' Mulder hoped that would remain true for the whole experience.

He got two beers from the fridge and handed one to Chris. He took his customary position on the couch and motioned Chris to a chair. There was a long, awkward silence.

'What would you like me to call you?'

Mulder was stuck. Hadn't thought about it. 'I don't know.'

'You don't have to make something up. It's just some people prefer not to use their real names.'

Mulder grinned wryly: 'Yeah, well, I've gone through my whole life preferring not to use my real name, so that'll be no hardship.'

'Is it Algernon?'

The unexpected question made Mulder laugh hard, and Chris joined him. Mulder knew it was probably whore humor, reserved for uptight first-timers like him, but it was still funny and it DID make him feel looser to laugh with this guy.

'No, but it's not far off it.'

'How about I give you a name then?'

'Fire away.'

Chris took a long slug of beer and appraised Mulder carefully through slitted eyes. Either he was a good actor or he really was trying to find a name that fit.

'I think Tom suits you.'

Mulder shrugged his approval. Tom was okay. Tom was manly enough to get him through this night and out the other side without turning into a screaming queen.

Mulder finished his beer and got another. 'You want one?' Chris held up his bottle to show it was still half full. Mulder didn't care - he'd had two earlier before Chris had even shown up; he needed the courage.

'Need the courage?' The question that so closely mirrored his thoughts was asked without teasing and - after a second of hesitation - Mulder nodded.

'First time?' 

'Yeah.'

'Why?'

Again, he hadn't expected the man to ask. To his own surprise, he told him. Everything. Chris didn't interrupt and didn't laugh at him. When Mulder finished, he only nodded sombrely before saying: 'You must really love her.'

Mulder felt his eyes sting. The first person - the only person - he'd ever told had understood completely. He felt a wave of relief at this stranger's validation of his complex emotions. He hid his awkwardness with a short laugh: 'Funny way to show it, right?'

Chris didn't make light of it though. He smiled at Mulder and shrugged. 'Anything you want to do tonight is fine by me. Anything you don't want to do is fine by me too. I want you to enjoy it, but that's just my ego talking.'

He stood up and sat down beside Mulder on the couch. Despite four beers, Mulder started to shake, but Chris didn't touch him, just spoke as casually as if they were discussing the NBA draft. 'Listen, a lot of people yell 'no' and 'stop' during sex even though they're having a good time, but if you want me to stop doing anything at all, just say 'stop please' and I'll stop, okay? You can trust me.' 

Mulder could only nod; he didn't trust his voice not to shake. He put his beer down on the table and waited for it to start.

He flinched as Chris touched his lower back through his T-shirt, and started to rub him there. Mulder was so tense his teeth were chattering. Chris grinned at him and Mulder shrugged, a little embarrassed.

'If you tell me to relax, I'll punch you.'

'If I punch you, will you relax?'

Once again, they grinned together and Mulder's shivering subsided. Chris moved behind him on the couch, pushing him forward a little until Mulder was sitting between his jeans-clad legs. He pushed his hands under Mulder's shirt and started to massage his back. Despite his discomfort, Mulder started to enjoy the massage. He had a lot of kinks to work out that were purely non-sexual too, and was soon arching into Chris's firm hands.

Chris's hands were strong and warm and kneaded his muscles like an expert's. 

And then he slid one hand gently round to Mulder's right nipple, and brushed across it. 

Mulder sucked in a breath and felt his abs clench in readiness for flight, but the motion was not repeated. Just as he started to relax again, Chris's left hand ran down his ribs to the front of his hip. Again, Mulder tensed and his breathing became shallow with nerves. Again his right nipple was brushed and he felt it stiffen against Chris's palm. Chris pressed his palm against it, then started to roll it between his finger and thumb. Mulder's nipples had always been sensitive - he loved to play with them as he masturbated to images of Scully - but the feeling of another hand on them was electric. Now Chris brought his other hand to his left nipple and suddenly Mulder was being groped by a man and not pulling away. 

'You like that?'

'Uhhuh'

Chris pulled him gently back against his own chest and Mulder realized that at some point the man had taken his shirt off. He could feel Chris's warm skin against his back as he played with his nipples. Mulder looked down, then quickly pulled off his shirt so he could watch what was happening to him. He felt so slutty it was embarrassing, but somehow the shame of it increased the pleasure. Below Chris's hands, Mulder could see his own abs rising and falling hard as the sensations flowed from his nipples through his whole body. He groaned and pushed his hips off the couch, feeling his cock stirring.

'I'm getting hard,' he said, and he could hear the panic in his own voice.

'Of course you are,' said Chris, soothingly. 'You have sensitive nipples. You'd get hard if they rubbed against a brick wall.'

Mulder smiled. It was true. Sometimes pulling on his black suit jacket gave him a hard-on. It was tighter than his others, and always slid sensually against his chest.

'Imagine what a woman feels with those big hard nipples!'

Mulder's hips jerked at Chris's words and he let out a moan at the thought of Scully's nipples between his fingers, between his lips, between his teeth. How she'd arch and cry out as he flicked and sucked and nibbled at her. 

His cock was now fully erect and he reached to touch it, rubbing it slowly through the denim. Somehow the fact that Chris was behind him - and not staring him in the face - made this easier. Maybe the guy knew that. 

'You want to get your cock out for me?'

'Yes.'

'Or do you want me to get it out for you?'

'Yes.'

Mulder whimpered as he watched Chris's large, masculine hands slide down his belly to his fly, just as his own did every night on the couch, to images of his partner bending, stroking, licking, parting her lips and her legs for him.

'unnnnnh!'

'You okay?'

'Yes.'

'Thought you'd come.'

'What do you think I am, a fucking amateur?'

Now it was Chris's turn to laugh throatily, but silence quickly resumed as he peeled Mulder's jeans down from his cock, which was already half-escaped from his boxer-briefs.

'Jesus.'

'What's wrong?' Mulder looked down, suddenly worried.

'You're pretty big.'

Mulder shrugged. He watched so much porn he figured he was just a bit larger than average, but apparently not. Maybe those nervous women hadn't been the wimps he'd thought they were.

He felt Chris shift under him, and suppressed panic again as he felt the man's naked cock against his ass. Then he cried out as Chris closed his hand around his shaft and started to stroke him. It had been three long years since anything but his own right hand had touched him there, and he'd forgotten how exciting it could be. It didn't matter that it was another man - Mulder knew he wouldn't have cared if Ted Bundy had gripped his cock, he'd have felt the same way, and he started to thrust into Chris's hand. 'Ah, fuck! Fuck!' 

'You gonna come for me?'

'Oh fuck yeah.' Chris squeezed tight and held still, letting Mulder's frantic jerks become a frenzy in his arms. He arched, pressing his hard-on between Mulder's cheeks, and the unexpected stimulation sent long jets of white pumping out of Mulder's cock and across his chest and stomach.

He lay, spent and exhausted in Chris's arms, feeling the other man rubbing his cock gently between the cheeks of his ass.

'Jesus.' Mulder was breathless.

Chris's movements were becoming harder against him, even while his hand gentled his empty cock.

'Tom?' Mulder was surprised to hear the note of ragged desperation in Chris's voice.

'Yeah?'

'Tom I really want to fuck you. I'm so fucking turned on right now. I know this is your first time and if you don't want me to I won't but, fuck!'

Mulder could feel Chris shaking beneath him, feel his hot breath on his shoulder, and his insistent cock stabbing dangerously close to his opening. Chris's hands on his cock and balls were already getting him hard again and the feel of his cock between his cheeks - while completely alien - was also turning him on enormously. 

Mulder had always been intrigued by the idea of anal penetration - even before Sam Short. He often slid a finger into his own ass during masturbation, delighting in the extra sensations it brought to his climax. But his opening felt so tight that he'd never dared insert anything larger in there. Sometimes he felt a pressure in his ass that he had no way to relieve. It could last for days, and made him feel slutty and super-sensitive. In his wilder fantasies, he had imagined Scully fingering his ass, and the image always made him come fast and hard.

That pressure was back there now, making him squirm, even though he'd just come. Coming wasn't enough to relieve it, he knew. Nothing but time had ever relieved it, and it always came back...

Now he twisted to look at Chris's face, searching it for lies as he panted and jerked beneath him.

'Please man. I've never wanted it so bad. I want to stick it in you.'

He groaned and Mulder realized this was not an act for his benefit. The man was close to raping him.

'I don't want to get hurt,' he said nervously.

'Lean forward then. I need to stick a finger up your ass.'

Mulder shivered at the words. He did as he was told, leaning his forearms on the coffee table, his own cock now straining again. Chris wiped his fingers through the cum on Mulder's belly for lubrication, and in one careful but forceful movement, he pushed a finger into Mulder's ass. Mulder groaned in pain and then imagined it was Scully's finger inside him and the pleasure shot through his ass like a firework.

'You okay?'

Mulder nodded and Chris started working in and out, gently at first, then more urgently. Mulder bit his lip as he felt a second finger force its way in. 'ah, fuck, Chris!'

'Sorry, man. sorry.' But Chris's voice was shaking with lust and soon he was working two fingers into Mulder's anus, scissoring them to widen him in readiness for his cock, as Mulder played with himself. Suddenly Chris's fingers disappeared and he pushed Mulder onto his knees over the table and positioned himself behind him. Mulder looked round and saw that Chris's cock was about seven inches long. It wasn't big, but it was a helluva lot bigger than his fingers, and Mulder felt a sharp pang of fear, but the rising excitement in his cock and balls and the relentless ache deep in his asshole made him keep still as Chris put his hands on his cheeks and spread them. He felt painfully vulnerable and open as he felt Chris's cock bump against him and start to press forward.

'Breathe out as I push in, okay?' panted Chris. 'I'll try to go slow, but fuck me you're so fucking hot...'

The pressure on his asshole increased and instead of fear, Mulder felt himself getting more and more turned on by the mixture of pleasure and pain that intensified every second. The pressure was enormous, and the thought that his ass was being stretched to accommodate something so big made his own dick leak onto the floor and his balls tighten. 

He closed his eyes and thought of Scully behind him, a dildo strapped to her soft hips, red curls cradling a hard rubber shaft, her nipples just inches from his back, and he let out another moan of want. 

Chris grunted and jabbed forward and Mulder winced but stayed still. He wanted this badly, he suddenly realized. Even if it hurt, he wanted someone - anyone - to pierce his hole and fuck him hard. He needed to feel it; he needed to know if it was just the penetration he craved - or the man invading him. Instinctively he understood that the distinction was subtle but crucial to the way he felt about being bent over his coffee table and sodomized.

With another little jerk, Chris's cock popped into his ass and Mulder cried out in shock. It felt bigger inside than it had looked outside. His ass was stretched wide and the guy was only an inch inside. 

'Oh god! I can't wait. I can't wait.' Chris was almost sobbing behind him, and pushed a little harder. Mulder shouted in pain, but he didn't shout 'please stop' and suddenly Chris was up him all the way. Mulder cried out again and again as Chris started to fuck him. 'Oh god, you're so tight, you're so fucking tight!' Chris reached round and started to pinch his nipples again and Mulder writhed in agonized pleasure. 

'Oh yeah!'

'You like this?' said Chris. 'You want some more?'

Mulder could not imagine any more but begged for it anyway, and Chris gripped his hipbones and started to fuck him like an animal rutting in the wild, focused only on the hole he was fucking and the pleasure it gave him. Mulder wasn't touching his cock any more, but he imagined Scully's beautiful ass driving the dildo into him, her small round breasts swinging with effort, and felt his orgasm start deep inside where Chris was jerking and pounding. He felt his muscles start to spasm and cried out - Mulder had never come with anything so big in his ass before and the feeling of clenching in waves around Chris's solid hot cock made him gush in great white bursts across the floor.

Chris saw it and his own impending climax gave him extra power to shove into Mulder's asshole. He impaled him again and again, faster and faster until he came, almost blind with sensation, and shot into the sweetest, tightest virgin ass he'd ever fucked.

Mulder felt Chris slide slowly out of him, and cried out in pain as his cock passed back through his bruised and battered opening. 

'I'm sorry.'

Mulder looked up at Chris. The man looked mortified. 'I'm so sorry. That's never happened to me before. I mean, I'm a pro. But I just... I had to... my god...' He tailed off, looking almost tearful. 'Are you okay?'

Mulder nodded slowly and got to his feet. 'I think so.' 

Chris checked him out. 'You are bleeding a little. Jesus, I'm so sorry.'

But Mulder only shrugged. 'Forget it. I could have stopped you. I wanted it.'

'But it was your first time and I wanted to make it so good for you.'

'It was good for me Chris. I shot about a gallon of cum halfway to the kitchen!' 

'You sure?'

Mulder nodded. It was true. The pressure inside his ass had burst like a dam as he came. He'd never felt such relief and physical satisfaction. Sure it had hurt, but he knew he'd found what he wanted, and felt calm and happy.

'You want a shower?'

'Thanks.'

Mulder pointed Chris to the bathroom. He turned at the door and smiled shyly again. 'You want to join me?'

Mulder thought about it, then shook his head.

'You want to fuck me?'

'No.'

Chris couldn't quite hide his disappointment, but showered quickly, then Mulder took his place.

They emerged with Mulder's mismatched towels slung around their hips. Chris sat on the couch and Mulder tried to, then winced and got right back up again, shrugging ruefully at the pain in his ass. 

'Jesus, how long before I can sit down?'

'Tomorrow should be fine, but do it carefully for a week or so.'

Mulder leaned a hip against the table as Chris slowly got dressed. They were silent for a long time and Chris's eyes lingered on the generous bulge that showed plainly under Mulder's towel.

'So, what do you think, Tom?' Chris's voice had an edge of anxiety now.

Mulder blinked slowly. 'I'm not gay,' he said.

Chris looked genuinely surprised. 'Really?'

Mulder nodded. 'When you...touched me... all I could think of was her. It was so easy to let it happen if I thought of her doing those things to me.'

'Even when I fucked you in the ass?' The jealousy in Chris's voice surprised both of them.

'Yeah, even then. I mean...' Mulder blushed a little. 'It was the feeling I wanted. I wanted to know what it feels like to have something that big inside me when I come. It's so... fucking different! But it was her I thought of to make me come.' He hesitated and reddened: 'And I thought maybe... I mean... I know some women will do that for their man, y'know?'

'Yeah, well, good luck finding one!'

Mulder shrugged. 'Well, I've experienced it now - and it was great - but I can live without it. But I wouldn't want to live without.. her.'

Chris nodded morosely.

'You doing stuff to me was hot but the thought of doing stuff to you - to any man - sucking you off or fucking you - it just did nothing for me. All I could think about was her, eating her out, being inside her, making her come.'

Mulder felt himself hardening yet again, just saying the words out loud for the first ever time. He saw Chris's blatant disappointment.

'I'm sorry Chris. I guess it just made me realize that the reason I don't get hard for other women is just because I love her so much. It has nothing to do with being gay.'

Chris shrugged: 'Well, I guess it'd be stupid to tell you I hadn't hoped you'd come down on the other side!' he laughed, but not with a lot of feeling. 'But you had a good time right?'

'Yeah, are you kidding? I mean, you were great; you gave me just what I wanted. Thank you.'

'No, thank you. I had a great time tonight too.' He hesitated, battling to say the next thing right. 'If ever you change your mind, or she won't... things don't work out and you just want a one off...not for money, I mean...just...

Mulder grinned. 'I guess it'd be stupid to tell you I won't keep it in mind.'

'Here's my number. Not the agency. I hope you call.'

They moved to the door and Chris stepped into the hallway, then turned back. Once again, he was struggling to find the right words. Mulder waited patiently, curious about what was coming next.

'Can I kiss you goodbye?'

Mulder froze. Somehow getting fucked in the ass by someone seemed a lot less intimate than kissing them. Kissing implied some sort of relationship, some sort of commitment, some sort of love. He was also a little scared of it - he'd decided he wasn't gay. The experiment was over. What if he enjoyed kissing the guy now? He looked into Chris's eyes and saw how hard it had been for him to ask. 

Mulder couldn't bring himself to give him permission, but after a moment's contemplation, he simply closed his eyes. He felt Chris's breath close on his cheek, and then a soft kiss on his lips. Chris tried to deepen the kiss, but Mulder drew back a little, then turned his head away and opened his eyes...

'Scully!'

Scully stood in the hallway, her eyes wide with shock.

Mulder jerked back from Chris, horribly aware that he was wearing nothing but a towel - not to mention horribly aware that he'd just been caught kissing a man. He couldn't even claim it was innocent - the guy had just jerked him off and fucked him raw.

Scully's usually pale skin suffused with blood and she dropped her eyes and turned quickly to walk away. Mulder glanced meaningfully at Chris and the escort nodded his rueful understanding that THIS was the woman that this man he called Tom wanted above him. Then Mulder went after Scully, one hand holding his towel around his hips.

He caught up with her at the elevator where she was jabbing the call button frantically. When she realized he'd come after her, she tried to duck through the door to the stairwell but he blocked her way.

'Get out of my way, Mulder.'

'Scully, please don't go. Please!'

'Why not, Mulder? You're obviously otherwise engaged.'

'Please come inside and let me explain Scully.'

'I don't need an explanation Mulder. What you do in your personal life is no business of mine.'

She talked the talk, but Mulder could see the tears shining in her eyes that meant she felt his personal life was EXACTLY her business - just as he'd long considered hers to be HIS. The thought made him dizzy. Had he found Scully and lost her all in the same stupid moment? He felt his heart clench in his chest at the horror.

He put a hand on her forearm. She shook it off and he replaced it. 'Scully please...'

'If you're going to tell me it's not what it looks like Mulder, then you're a fucking liar.' Her bottom lip quivered in anguish and he longed to cover it with his own lips and prove to her that his heart - and his body - were hers for the taking. Instead he kept his hand on her arm, and took a deep breath.

'No, Scully, it's exactly what it looks like. But if you knew why, then maybe... I don't know... maybe you'd understand?' 

'You're gay, Mulder. I understand. Now can I please go home?'

Right on cue, the elevator doors clanked open, but Mulder tightened his grip on her arm to keep her in the hallway.

'Scully, I'm not. I was trying to...' 

'Yeah? Well, maybe you should break the news to your boyfriend. Now let me go.'

She jerked her arm back but he moved with her, only tightening his grip and making her flinch with pain. He winced to see he'd hurt her but he knew he had to keep her from leaving if they were ever going to face what had just happened. He knew if she went, he'd never have the courage to bring it up with her again. 

He looked back down the corridor as a neighbor opened his door and peered out at them. 'Scully, please come inside. Please! I'm wearing a towel here!'

He looked at her pleadingly and she could see the desperation in his eyes. She finally pulled her arm from his grasp and stalked angrily into his apartment. The good looking man who'd been kissing Mulder must have slipped away down the back stairwell, as there was no sign of him. Turning to face Mulder as he closed the door behind him, she could see he wasn't even curious about where the man had gone - he was entirely focused on her.

Now that they were in his apartment, it was hard to start the conversation up again. Mulder shifted uncomfortably in his towel and Scully tried not to look at the very obvious bulge in it. As she did, though, she felt tears flooding her eyes and cursed her stupidity. One day, she'd hoped, she'd dreamed, she'd fantasized, that she'd get a proper look at that bulge - and more. Any fool could see Mulder was packing, even in those loose suit pants he wore to work; sometimes he'd turn round in their cramped office and nearly have her damned eye out! Now all she could think about was that whoever was getting a close up view of Mulder's equipment, it wasn't her and was never likely to be. The bulge was just a torment - a mockery - to her now.

'Do you want to put some clothes on Mulder?' The weariness in her voice betrayed the fact that she knew she was beaten. Another woman and she would have had a fighting chance, but not this. She hadn't seen this coming. Mulder was good looking and sensitive and well groomed and kind and... a whole bunch of gay things, but for some reason, he'd never seemed gay to her. Maybe she'd been blinded by the fact that every time he looked at her she melted inside, that every time he touched the small of her back, she wanted to arch into his hand until his fingers slid warmly between her ass cheeks - and further; that every time she ignored an innuendo, she secretly took it out later and turned it over in her mind, examining it from all angles like a precious stone, sometimes building a fantasy around his words that ended in her whimpering into her pillow as she came on her own slick hand.

As Mulder dressed in the bedroom, Scully sighed. Whatever it was, she'd missed the bigger picture. For six long years she'd lusted after a gay man. She realized that a large part of the anger she felt was at her own stupidity, rather than at Mulder. They'd never talked of their sexuality. What right did she have to expect him to want her? Sure, there had been Phoebe and Diana but she knew both those relationships had been disasters for Mulder. Maybe this was why. She felt faint and sick with gut-wrenching disappointment and sadness. She felt like a frumpy wife whose husband has just confessed he's been cheating with a high school cheerleader. How could she compete? She couldn't.

Mulder came out of the bedroom in low-slung jeans and a black T-shirt, feet bare. She sighed - there it was again, the thrill of seeing him, and he'd only been gone half a minute AND she knew he was gay now! What the hell was wrong with her?!

There was a moment of awkward silence, the Mulder began. 'Scully... thanks for coming in with me. For giving me a chance to explain.'

'Okay Mulder. Then explain.'

'You're going to hate me.'

She sighed heavily: 'I hope not.' Although she thought that's just the way this might end up.

'You're going to think I'm the biggest, stupidest, idiot on the planet.'

It was plain from his miserable, nervous face that he wasn't joking, but Scully still found that description a little funny and she couldn't help smiling. 'Only this planet Mulder?'

He relaxed a little and returned her smile, then got serious again and rubbed his hands over his face, almost whining at the difficulty he was facing in telling her. She sighed again and sat on the couch, patting the cushion beside her in what she hoped was a genuinely friendly and encouraging manner.

'Mulder, why don't we just both sit down and talk?'

'I can't Scully.'

'I thought you wanted to explain?'

'I can explain Scully, but I can't sit down.' She looked at him quizzically and he agonized for a second, then blurted out: 'I just paid some guy to fuck me in the ass and it hurts like hell.'

Scully's eyes were like saucers, her mouth widened in an O of surprise, and her cheeks went bright red. She met Mulder's embarrassed eyes and suddenly they both burst out laughing simultaneously.

'Jesus Mulder! What were you--?'

'Oh Scully, don't ask. I'm so embarrassed by this that if it wasn't so important I would have just dived out the window when you saw that guy kissing me.'

'Was that the one who...'

'Yeah.'

'But why...?'

Again, he struggled to find the words. After a couple of false starts he went with simple truth: 'Because I'd started to wonder.'

'Wonder what?'

'Whether I was gay.'

'But you... why would you wonder that Mulder?'

Mulder blushed again and Scully realized she'd seen him blush more times in the past 5 minutes than she had the whole time they'd been partners.

'Because you... Because I...' He struggled and stammered and writhed in embarrassment and then finally said his piece. 'Because all these years I've loved you and wanted you and you never give me the slightest hint that you might feel the same way about me. And because I've stopped being interested in anyone other than you, Scully. No one else turns me on. And so I started thinking, maybe I'm barking up the wrong tree here, and maybe I need to explore other... aspects... of myself. I mean, I started thinking, if you don't want me, and I don't want any other woman, then what the hell, maybe I need to start looking elsewhere to find out if I'm gay or just straight and in love with a woman who doesn't want me.'

His speech at an end, Mulder and Scully just stared at each other - he amazed that he'd managed to say it, and she astonished to hear it. 

'Mulder...' she started, then stopped, her mind in turmoil. She tried to collect her thoughts, to answer him as fully yet neatly as he had in telling her his problem, but it was beyond her. 'In love?' she queried, as if she hadn't heard him properly.

He nodded miserably.

'Mulder,' she started again, with more purpose. 'I had no idea. No idea what you were going through. And I'm so sorry.'

He looked surprised to hear real sympathy in her voice.

'I'm so sorry you had to do this - all because I was too scared to show you how I really feel.'

Mulder's head snapped up as her words sunk in. 'What do you mean, Scully?'

She got off the couch and walked over to him, staring up into his deep hazel eyes. 'I want you so bad Mulder that sometimes it hurts.'

To Scully's surprise, Mulder started to shake. 'Scully, if that's a joke, it's not a funny one.'

She put a hand on his T-shirt over his heart. 'No joke Mulder. I love you. And I'm sorry I didn't say it years ago.'

And suddenly they were in each other's arms, laughing and crying and then came the first touch of lips, and suddenly the night became tender and quiet and so special that April 12 would be wonderful forever in their memories.

***

They didn't make love that first night. But they did hold each other all night long and whisper as new lovers do, of when they knew and how they knew and of the million things that brought them together and would keep them together, and there was laughter and tears in almost equal measure as they realized how close they had come to losing it all.

And, as each of them had hardly dared hope, nothing was off limits in their newfound world of togetherness and when Scully wanted to hear the story of Chris from the beginning, Mulder told it with such self-deprecating wit that it quickly became their shared funny secret - how Scully had driven Mulder into the arms of a gay man.

'It was a lot more than arms,' he winced, shedding the humiliation of the evening with every giggle he elicited from her.

'I know, you poor man!' She said, gently stroking his violated ass through his jeans. 'You ARE the biggest stupidest idiot on the planet.'

***

When they did have sex Mulder was even more embarrassed that he could have mistaken anything else for what he found with Scully. 

At first their couplings were hot but pretty straightforward, but Mulder let Scully lead and soon discovered that six long years of nothing but fantasies had fed her imagination just as it had sustained his. 

Mulder would wake to find his cock hardening in Scully's hot liquid mouth; she put up a spirited but always doomed resistance as he overpowered her and cuffed her to the filing cabinets in the basement office before pulling her mouth roughly down to his throbbing erection or forcing her legs apart to allow access to his muscular tongue. In the elevator on the way to Skinner's office, she pulled her damp panties aside so he could thrust two fingers into her, then watched - clenching with desire - as he stroked them casually under his nose while he reported to the Assistant Director; she delighted in his honed oral talents which included filling her with cherries or ice cubes and sucking them out lazily, one by one. In fact, he loved to take her to the edge of the precipice, then watch her face as he unexpectedly pushed all kinds of things into her, and Scully was regularly surprised into earth-shattering orgasms by assorted zucchini, flashlights, kitchen utensils and - on one memorably filthy occasion - the cold, hard barrel of his Sig Sauer. With the clip removed, of course. Mulder was a pervert, but he was no fool.

After the night Mulder managed - with great determination and concentration - to slowly feed his big cock and both his balls into a groaning Scully's eager cunt, he tore up Chris's number without a pang. 

Three months into their relationship, Mulder eased a thumb into Scully's ass as he fucked her doggy-style, making her come violently. The next morning he woke to find his balls in her mouth and her finger probing his anus in return. When she saw him lose control before the first knuckle, she licked him clean, then lay beside him, running that same finger around his hard nipple while he got his breath back.

'Did you like that Mulder?'

'Oh yeah,' he panted, with feeling.

She smiled, then mused over his heaving chest: 'Mulder?' she asked teasingly, 'What are you getting me for my birthday?'

'When is it?,' he teased back and they wrestled briefly, he nipping her breasts and pressing his softening cock roughly against her still sensitive opening, she pinching his nipples, until they stilled and continued the conversation.

'Why? What do you want, Scully?'

She looked innocently into his eyes: 'Do you think they make some kind of strap-on dildo?'

Mulder almost swooned. 'You'd do that for me?'

'Not everything is about you, Mulder' she reminded him with the eyebrow, 'It's MY birthday. And, there's nothing I'd like to do better on my birthday than to fuck you in the ass.’

And if six years together hadn't convinced them, they knew then that they were made for each other.


End file.
